The associations between self-consciousness and internalizing/externalizing problems among Chinese adolescents
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Published on: January 17, 2025
Yan-Gang Nie1, Jian-Bin Li2, Kai Dou3
1Department of Psychology, School of Education, Guangzhou University, 510006, China; Psychological and Behavioral Research Center of Cantonese, Guangzhou University, 510006, China.
Abstract:
Self-consciousness is considered as a multifaceted and hierarchical construct that includes self-evaluation, self-experience, and self-control. This study assumes that self-consciousness is a preventative factor of internalizing and externalizing problems among Chinese adolescents. 1202 Chinese adolescents from grade 7 to grade 12 participated in this study by completing a battery of questionnaires that assessed self-consciousness and internalizing/externalizing problems. The results showed that, after controlling demographic variables, some lower-order factors (i.e., sense of satisfaction, sense of anxiety, social self, self-restraint, self-esteem, and self-monitoring) and higher-order subscales (i.e., self-evaluation and self-experience) of self-consciousness significantly predicted internalizing problems, while externalizing problems were predicted by several lower-order factors (i.e., self-restraint, sense of satisfaction, and self-monitoring) and higher-order subscales (i.e., self-control and self-experience). In conclusion, this study demonstrates that Chinese adolescents' internalizing and externalizing problems are related with different aspects of self-consciousness, which sheds light on the prevention into adolescents' problem behaviors.
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